


suffocating

by wakuseiloop



Category: A3! (Video Game)
Genre: Blood, Hanahaki Disease, M/M, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-05
Updated: 2019-05-05
Packaged: 2020-02-26 00:36:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,192
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18712909
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wakuseiloop/pseuds/wakuseiloop
Summary: Even slow deaths should have started to weaken him, but this was just grass, plants, a wrong taste stuck in his throat. It’s grass and a sore throat that itches and constricts.[WARNING: ACT 5 SPOILERS]





	suffocating

**Author's Note:**

> for ame, for helping me proofread a fic i posted earlier!!! ty ty
> 
> tell me if u spot any typos or whatnot also oh

The first time Chikage feels the distinct taste of grass in his mouth, he remembers August and his beverages- whatever they ended up being. He remembers poison and drugs, and he wonders if the Organization had managed to find him, had decided to end his life for being a traitor. He thinks about protecting Hisoka, Hisoka’s life, thinks about August again, thinks about the company, thinks about goodbyes, thinks until his brain gives out.

 

\--

 

The second time he tastes plants, they feel closer to touching his tongue, as if sliding up his throat at an unbearably slow speed. His head runs the possibility of poison again, of illness, of assassination- but somehow he’s not really weakening, he’s not really ill. It’s a constant bother, but his life seems at no risk, not yet, and it’s taking too slow, and it makes no sense. 

 

Even slow deaths should have started to weaken him, but this was just grass, plants, a  _ wrong _ taste stuck in his throat. It’s grass and a sore throat that itches and constricts.

 

Chikage wonders if it’s a cold, if the taste of plants is his imagination, if he’ll get better by tomorrow if he just takes some medicine, sleeps for once.

 

He sighs to himself, whirring of his laptop fan the only constant noise against concrete walls. He had ran away to their hideout, the usual when uneasiness took over, had lied to Itaru when heading out, promised to pay him for his silence and a few white lies. 

 

He shuts his laptop after a cough breaks through, decides to take something and try to sleep. 

 

\--

 

A week or two pass by, every day carefully counted and monitored. Chikage keeps away from the dorm for their safety, to not get them sick, to hide the fact that he’s been coughing non stop. His throat burns, itches, everything tasting like he has a mouthful of dirt. 

 

It’s not too hard to get used to the silence again, but, even so, he finds himself missing even Itaru’s gaming during the nights he stayed around and awake. 

 

He closes his eyes, glasses by his side on the couch, dark walls watching as he places a hand by his mouth and coughs. 

 

Whatever is down his throat will not come up, and, by the time he’s done coughing- everything sore and hurting- his head is spinning with a headache, and the world feels out of touch.

He blinks, and then Mikage’s eye is right in front of him, and Chikage falls backwards against the couch. 

 

“Hisoka?” Why are you here, have you been following me, you’ve been watching me, haven’t you, just-

“April” Chikage’s thinking stops, and he raises a hand to push Mikage away.

“I’m fine”

“You’re sick…” Mikage doesn’t push or recoil from Chikage’s hand, and Chikage doesn’t push him away.

“I’m -” Mikage interrupts with a glare, and Chikage feels like sighing.

“Why’re you hiding it” Why was he hiding it.

“I’m...not” that’s a lie, Chikage knows that Mikage can tell, but he tries even so, feels too tired to try anything else for no reason. 

“Liar” in a second, Mikage’s next to him on the couch, and it takes all of Chikage’s self control not to jump across the room out of habit. “Everyone’s worried…Sakuya looks so restless” Mikage frowns, lets himself fall of Chikage’s shoulder. “Even Itaru offered marshmallows to come get you…” Chikage lets himself laugh, and Mikage plops a marshmallow into his mouth before pushing one against Chikage’s cheek. 

 

The pain’s numbing, and Chikage almost forgets it’s there, almost forgets its constant humming.

 

Almost.

 

“Azuma said he’d help you fall asleep, too” Mikage looks pouty, maybe jealous, maybe something else, but Chikage can’t analyze, can’t do anything but push him away, double over and cough. 

 

As if the mere mention of the name had triggered something, Chikage feels as though he’s suffocating. 

 

It makes no sense for that to be a trigger, he thinks to himself, Hisoka’s hand on his hair as Chikage feels himself almost tear up. 

 

His head hurts. 

 

“Let’s go home” mumbled through a marshmallow, worry even Chikage can feel present in Mikage’s quiet tone. 

 

\--

 

By the time they make it back to the dorm, Chikage’s coughing seems to have died down, and they’re back to their usual bantering. When they walk in, a tired “we’re home” leaving both of them, they’re greeted by noisy worry from all over the place, and Chikage thinks about how he’s really come to miss this. 

 

\--

 

Through hiding his coughing and choking that slowly worsens, Chikage manages to convince almost everyone that it’s just a regular cold (actual bullshit, because it did not feel like a cold, and he’s pretty sure there’s something growing in his throat instead), and he goes on with his life. 

 

Itaru, though, sharp as he is sometimes, does not buy his shit, and seems to be glaring at him almost every night in their room. 

 

It’s uncomfortable, very much so, but he chooses to ignore it, because talking hurts when you got a  _ whatever that thing is _ stuck down your throat and crawling up. 

 

Maybe he had to go to the hospital? But that was...not easy, dangerous, even.

 

“Say” Itaru starts from the bed next to Chikage’s. Chikage simply graons in reply. “I get that you’re living some...illegal life out there, but” Itaru interrupts himself for a quiet noise of victory, and Chikage nearly snorts. “can’t you go get checked?” 

“No” Chikage’s response is immediate, because he doesn’t want to deal with that, not now, when he’s feeling like collapsing and someone might come after him. 

“Senpai” Chikage sighs in exasperation, sits up to turn and look at Itaru.

“I’ll be fine” he flashes him a smile, and Itaru rolls his eyes before dropping his phone on the pillow.

 

Wow. Serious talk. 

 

“You’ve been dying for, like, three weeks” Itaru grabs his phone back up, fidgets with it, drops it back again. “Even at work there’s rumouring….I keep getting cornered” Chikage half-smiles, Itaru looks like he’s pouting. 

 

There’s silence, just the two of them sitting, until Itaru speaks up.

 

“Hisoka told me” Chikage blinks, looks at Itaru a little too sternly. Itaru looks like he’s thinking, figuring out what to say, how to say anything.

“Hisoka?” What’d he say now, what unnecessary thi-

“Azuma-san” At the name, Chikage chokes, feels the crawling come up stronger, coughs and claws at his throat as Itaru looks away with too-knowing eyes.

 

It takes a while before Chikage calms down, wipes his maybe bloody hand on his shirt. They fall into silence, and Itaru shrugs, looks apologetic before turning around and picking his phone again.

 

Nothing else is said, a whisper of “Chigasaki, what the fuck?” stuck in Chikage’s throat. 

 

Later, Itaru texts him about Hanahaki Disease, and Chikage wants the Earth to just swallow him whole.

 

Of course, of course Hisoka would find out, of course Chigasaki would ask, would see, of course.

 

Chikage thinks about the this disease, thinks about Azuma, feels the plants in his throat ripping at his lungs and breathing, crawling until he tastes more blood. 

 

\--

 

At exactly three weeks since it started, Chikage locks himself in the bathroom to throw up, leaves and petals of beautiful camellias coated in blood falling out.

 

He thinks about his own idiocy before collapsing on the floor, breathing heavy and unstable, hands and everything coated in red. 

 

Making friends, finding a family- that he could forgive himself for, that he could live with. But a crush that’s  _ killing _ him? Maybe not so much, he can’t forgive himself for that, maybe he can’t live with that (and at this rate, he won’t, he won’t live at all). 

 

He thinks about August, sitting on the bathroom floor, blood and petals on his hands. He thinks about how he can’t protect the new life August wished for them like this, thinks about December, thinks about-

 

His senses alert him, and he flushes everything he can down the toilet before someone gets to knock on the door. He wants to clean up, wants to stop looking like a mess, wants to stop his throat from aching and itching and the camellias from escaping and dyeing everything again-

 

Maybe if it’s Mikage, maybe if it’s Itaru he can ask for help. Maybe if it’s anyone else he can push this away and pretend he’s just fine.

 

But life’s never kind, and he can hear Azuma’s worried breathing from the other side, and so Chikage lets his head fall down over the toilet to throw up again. It sounds horrible, not even the best of spy training helps with that, with the sounds one makes when they’re throwing up flowers of unrequited love.

 

Really, nothing prepares you for that, nothing helps, and he’s choking.

 

The door rattles slightly, Chikage forces himself to swallow blood clots and leaves, weakly flushes the toilet, falls over his glasses and feels the world blur. He lets himself fall on the floor, eyes on the ceiling and unfocused.

 

Azuma’s still outside, and Chikage wishes Mikage could show up somehow and help him, because he doesn’t know what to do with himself. 

 

He feels himself cry, a wave of nausea and the taste of blood up to his eyes washing over him. He doesn’t have enough energy to reach the toilet this time, throws up on the floor instead, blood on his glasses and hands and everywhere. He thinks about the door, thinks about cleaning up, thinks about going away for real this time before it gets any worse, thinks about-

 

“Chikage…?” Azuma’s voice is soft, full of worry, and Chikage almost laughs at how much it hurts. 

 

He had been avoiding him, even before knowing about the flowers, even before the pain started. He had been avoiding Azuma, because Chikage didn’t know what else to do, because he wasn’t supposed to feel anything, and he was not letting himself feel- wasn’t letting himself love someone.

 

_ Love someone _ \- at those words, a new flower blooms, and he lets out a choked noise as he feels it rip its way out. He’s trembling, choked noises and coughing hitting the walls and making the quiet calling of his name from outside hurt even more.

 

He just wants to leave, he wants to leave, he wants December, he wants August, he wants anyone that can just make the pain somehow end, that can rip the flowers from his lungs right now before he suffocates on petals and on his love. 

 

But there’s no one, Mikage isn’t here, August can’t come back- can’t calm him down, can’t help- and he’s once again overtaken by fear and loneliness he had not felt for almost a year, had almost forgotten, had let himself forget.

 

Breathing hurts, but the surge of flowers seems to have stopped, died down for now. He focuses on pushing stems back down, on his eyes that slowly focus even through the tears, on picking his glasses up, wiping the blood on them and his hands somewhere on his shirt and failing miserably.

 

Azuma is still by the door, Chikage can tell, even if he’s silent, and he’s not sure if to open the door or stay here until he somehow dies or teleports away, until Azuma gets tired of waiting, until-

 

He’s wiping his eyes and focused on his thoughts, is too late to realize that the door’s opening- because of course there must be an emergency key, and of course Azuma wasn’t just going to leave him to die here,  _ of course _ -, is too late to clean up the mess of blood and flowers on the floor in front of him.

 

Maybe, just maybe, he wishes the flowers just now had killed him.

 

Azuma walks in, steps seem to halt not far from there and, even though Chikage can’t see his face, he can sense he’s worried. Can feel his eyes, darting from one side of the room to the other, from Chikage, to the blood, to the flowers, to-

 

“I’m going to call-” Chikage’s ears ring, his head spins, and he’s not sure what he wants right now, but Azuma’s warmth seems to be number one, even if it’s also what’s making him die.

 

He tries to steady his breathing, summon his voice, manages only to shake his head and look away. 

 

He feels pathetic. He feels the flowers back again. 

 

Azuma doesn’t say anything, instead sits down in front of him, and Chikage can’t breathe. 

 

His throat is like a labyrinth of regret, everything hurts.  Normally sharp senses are numbed by pain and tears, and Chikage wonders where all those years of training to withstand pain went, wonders where he even learnt to cry this much.

 

Azuma’s hands are suddenly warm on him, and Chikage’s control of anything he has left crumbles, camellias and leaves and everything breaking through clots and closed lips. 

 

It’s gross, really, blood and plants all over Azuma’s shirt, sobs and choking and pain and  _ everything _ all over both of them and-

 

Chikage wonders, as Azuma hugs him with kind arms, if maybe he deserves this pain.

**Author's Note:**

> sorry about the abrupt ending i uh, got stuck on it for like 2 months and really didnt know what to do


End file.
